


Is the Devil at the Crossroads Yet?

by theskywasblue



Category: Saiyuki
Genre: Alternate Future, Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-01
Updated: 2010-06-01
Packaged: 2017-10-09 20:35:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/91343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theskywasblue/pseuds/theskywasblue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kougaiji knows the price of power.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Is the Devil at the Crossroads Yet?

**Author's Note:**

> For the prompt "Addiction". Time taken to write: 29 minutes.

_"You can't keep doing this Kou – it's too much! You have to stop!"_

"Leave me alone! You don't understand – I have to do this!"

Dokugakuji's hands are heavy, powerful on his shoulders, holding him down, holding him back, "Kou stop – just stop – what about us? What about your family?"

He pushes away, lashes out. Dokugakuji doesn't even flinch when the blow lands, and somehow that makes Kougaiji want to do it again, harder, just to get a reaction, to get him away, "My family is dead!"

***

His mother's garden has been dead for years. Kougaiji still likes to walk through it, picturing in his mind's eye all the flowers Rasetsunyo somehow made to grow, even in the unforgiving desert. No matter how he tries, nothing will grow for him in that soil. Something of its composition, or his, has fundamentally changed. At least outside the castle walls there is sound, life. When he wanders the castle's empty, dust-thick halls he feels like a ghost – the ghost of a prince, the ghost of someone who could have been a hero, but instead…

In the halls, his only companions are shadows, memory, and the faint lingering scent of cigarette smoke. Every now and then, when his mind wanders, he thinks he hears the faint jingle of bells, smells the soft earthiness of crushed herbs, or feels a warm, solid hand on his shoulder – but it is never anything more than his mind and heart playing tricks on him. He tries not to think about the past. He has boarded up the doors to the rooms that his memories haunt, and that is all he can do.

In his weaker moments, he thinks about them; wonders if Lirin is beautiful, if Yaone has a kind husband to take care of her, if Dokugakuji still laughs as easily as he used to. But whenever he thinks he might give everything up and go to them, he finds himself held fast, as if his feet are sunk into the floor, as if his body itself is part of Houtou's slowly crumbling foundations.

When the castle falls, he thinks, he will fall too – at last – he will finally be able to give up all the power, lift the weight up off his own shoulders.

He no longer remembers why he wanted the power he has, why he thought once that it had to be worth giving up everything for.

***

_"I'm sorry."_

They look at him like they can't really recognize his face at first. Lirin clings to Yaone, hides her eyes in the older woman's skirt. The knowledge that he's frightened her so terribly she cannot even look at him is like a knife in the prince's chest. Both women have been crying. Dokugakuji stands with slumped shoulders, as if that single blow Kougaiji delivered was a full-on beating, as if it hurts him just to breathe.

"Please – it was a mistake…Dokugaku I'm sorry."

The brunet's voice cracks a little as he speaks, "Do you need the power Kou? Is that what you really want?"

They don't understand that it's not about the power, really; it never has been. He knows what power brings – obsession, ruin – but he needs to protect them, even if it means driving them away. But power consumes, and if he takes hold of it, Kougaiji knows, one day he will lose everything, he will forget that he once loved them so much he was willing to give up his soul to save them.

-End-


End file.
